Design Awards 2015 - TrustNews Dec 15
For the award this year the Trust received fourteen entries. Each entry was studied in detail by the Awards Panel and all projects investigated on site, some more than once and some both from inside as well as outside. All entrants were also asked to submit their schemes on an A2 panel, with the specific reminder that the Awards are made for ‘design excellence as long lasting contribution to the City of Winchester’. These A2 displays, which were on show at our AGM, formed part of the Panel’s review also. It is worth noting that the Award Panel consisted of a very diverse group of professionals, one architect and educator, one urban designer and town planner, one farmer, one artist and one landscape architect. With regards to the Awards, the Panel were unanimous in making the decisions. The Trust as well as the Awards Panel were somewhat surprised by the relatively small number of entries received as compared to previous years. ln some ways this was accentuated by the fact that over half of the entries came from just two architectural practices. It was also noted that half of the entries employed the architectural materials palette of brick and zinc. Neither of these observations had any bearing on the Awards procedures; they are however noteworthy.
The winner was …
The winner was St Valentines Close, a scheme of 16 homes on the site of the old Winchester Laundry in Gordon Road. Chair of the Awards Panel, Hans Klaentschi complemented the designers, T2 Architects on presenting an interesting urban solution on a difficult site. He said “A rather calm internal ‘courtyard’ space has been achieved that is diagonally traversed by a pedestrian route linking Hyde Abbey Road with Gordon Road. The scale along this route varies greatly with individual houses of very different styles to the east and north. Great care went into materials and detail and the whole thing has a good air about it, though it is the urban, rather than the architectural aspects that are most convincing." The development was carried out by Drew Smith Homes who were presented with a blue plaque by the Mayor of Winchester at the Awards evening on 22nd October.
The scheme stood out amongst the 14 schemes submitted, all of which have made a valuable contribution to Winchester's townscape over the past 3 years.
Once again the Trust is indebted to David Marklew for his impeccable organization.
